No submarines, thank you. I hope a lot will be revealed when some product does emerge. Not my product though. Not my decision about what to say. I remain retired, with my only involvement being for something interesting to do in life after work. What I did for most of my working life was very different from audio. In that field measurements really were paramount. I have become convinced audio is different, although it took some time to arrive at that point of view.
And this is where it gets interesting and I wish I knew more about psychoacoustics. Sound stage is an oddity as 2 channels can only encode left and right. Height requires fooling around with HRTF to make you think the sound is coming from up (or down). LEDR synthesises this effect, whereas I suspect real music engages other parts of the brain that expect the sound to come from up. Can we infer soundstage where there is none?
This is indeed possible.
Well that's really handy as we all have a trained listener on speed dial 😛. Here is a test signal that can be analysed and people can compare and contrast and you dismiss in favour of your coven of trained listeners?
Let me get this straight. A group of audio nerds SAW someone messing with his turntable, expected a change and heard it? It's entirely possible you were the only one in the room that didn't fool themselves.
Can is the operative word. To use Olive's headphone work as an example of how it can get distorted, it's good valid work, a statistical analysis of preference over a wide range of listeners. His results spawn an entire cottage industry of third parties measuring headphones using what they believe to be an identical protocol and generating corrective equalisation curves with tiny level adjustments across fractions of an octave to align with Olive's mean. An entire culture of science ...appreciators take these up as reflecting objective truth, because measurements, and celebrate hearing closer to perfect reproductive accuracy.
Context lost in this chain are:
- Olive's result is a statistical analysis of preference
- it's a mean across a range of subject HRTFs
- in the case of IEMs using specific tips and insertion depths
- the third party test platforms haven't been calibrated against Olive's
- your HRTF, tip and insertion depth will almost certainly vary from Olive's mean
Many of these variances dwarf the EQ adjustment but once a graph hits paper it becomes 'objective truth', context is discarded and some odd conception of science wins again. Diverting back to topic, this appears relevant to both Devore's stories about the scientist's news release and the pursuit of 1 kHz clean power.
I find it so too and believe the most promising field for real innovation is applying those decades of auditory research to microphone techniques for recording music intended for speakers. Many nature recordists perform all kinds of experiments with various arrays straddling traditional spaced mics and binaural, the most successful to my ears employing elements of intra-aural delay and shadowing to taste.
For assessing playback I lean on these far more than something like "Brothers in Arms".
Hmm... I've in the Internet since it was DARPAnet... and I worked directly with the RFC... all they way to implementing stacks for IP, TCP and UDP... plus writing device drivers for the communication boards..
One thing I can tell you, TCP is indeed reliable and UCP can be made reliable if the layer above it so implements it... and the communication devices themselves implement all kinds of reliable data transmission. Fiber cables go through RX/TX devices on the transmission lines. (Yes, I did work on one of the original multimode fiber pizza boxes...).
So the bits do get through unscathed.
However, it's the old "0x0000CACA in, 0x0000CACA out"
Don't believe me? Ever peeked at Social Media?
So, just because the transmission of data bits is correct, it doesn't mean that the encoding and decoding of data is correct.
The main issues is how the data is sampled when recorded and then rendered. Not the storing, transmission and retrieval.
Hence, the Internet is not a proper example.
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You wouldnt have the internet without DISK DRIVES. They have raw coding/decoding errors which are effectively corrected.
Yes, entirely possible. They were setup. As I recall, it was the magnitude of the response, sort of a "I knew there'd be something, but not that good" which came up that I found startling, as in; what?
My view is that there is a conceptual contradiction.
At the end of the day we talk about the perception of sound-reproduction qualities, but what is the field of the perception qualities?
Is it the subjective field or is it the objective field?
Are sound qualities perceived by the sensor of a machine or by the sense of hearing?
If the latter is subjective then what is the position of the objectivists in Audio?
In my opinion, measurements are extremely important and indispensable to be shared between technicians, engineers and designers in order to increase technical knowledge and improve the technical and possibly the listening quality of amplifiers.
However, while the perception of sound-reproduction qualities is in the subjective field, measurements are in the objective field and they only talk about the "how much" not about the "how".
So the buyer of a power amplifier will undoubtedly read first the measurement values of the amp he has decided to buy, but unfortunately those measurement values will only tell him a part of the story.
At the end of the day we talk about the perception of sound-reproduction qualities, but what is the field of the perception qualities?
Is it the subjective field or is it the objective field?
Are sound qualities perceived by the sensor of a machine or by the sense of hearing?
If the latter is subjective then what is the position of the objectivists in Audio?
In my opinion, measurements are extremely important and indispensable to be shared between technicians, engineers and designers in order to increase technical knowledge and improve the technical and possibly the listening quality of amplifiers.
However, while the perception of sound-reproduction qualities is in the subjective field, measurements are in the objective field and they only talk about the "how much" not about the "how".
So the buyer of a power amplifier will undoubtedly read first the measurement values of the amp he has decided to buy, but unfortunately those measurement values will only tell him a part of the story.
Let me ask a question. Suppose you have a super-duper amp that ticks all the right boxes and as far we can be humanly sure, it reproduces whatever it is fed at the input perfectly at the output, only larger. The ideal wire with gain, if you want.
Now someone auditions the amp and finds it a bad amp, he/she/it wouldn't want it even if it was for free.
What conclusion(s) would you draw from this state of affairs?
Jan
Now someone auditions the amp and finds it a bad amp, he/she/it wouldn't want it even if it was for free.
What conclusion(s) would you draw from this state of affairs?
Jan
Like with all emotions.
When you like it and someone else doesn’t, who cares.
Love is blind (and deaf) 🤣
Hans
When you like it and someone else doesn’t, who cares.
Love is blind (and deaf) 🤣
Hans
Before I reply, let me make a premise.
I believe that neither objectivists nor subjectivists exist, no one is really only like one of that.
If not for personal interests, both material or philosophical.
Well, I find your example a bit "naive" (no offence intended, of course), since it is clear that - not only in Audio - nothing can please everyone, absolutely nothing since that is the basement of the biodiversity and you already seem to overlook the fact that listening is in the subjective field. 😉
Furthermore it seems to me that you want to draw a general rule from a potential and only possible exception, I'm not yet sure for what purpose.
However, please note that in order to be valid, critical (or not) listening to a stereo system has first to imply that multiple conditions are satisfied: one also need a quiet and adequate environment, a certain serenity of spirit, good mood and much more, not least mental health.
C'mon. You forgot some important prerequisites for a brilliant listening session.
Get laid before listening session and made dry a bottle of preferred 'sound enhancer' liquid.
It will ensure heavenly sound.
Yup, you can trust subjective evaluation over measurements any time. 😉
A person can be an objectivist in one field, for instance in a job, while being a subjectivist in another field, for instance which soccer club he thinks is 'the world's best'.
But beyond that, why not give an answer to my question? It is a normal tool to paint a situation and ask what people think of it, to get to the bottom of opinions. I am well aware that my premise is a bit artificial, it is designed that way. Instead, you tapdance all around it and avoid answering. Well, you don't have to answer of course, but then don't try to change my premise. It's a hypothetical situation, designed to get to the core. It's not 'an example'.
Jan
But beyond that, why not give an answer to my question? It is a normal tool to paint a situation and ask what people think of it, to get to the bottom of opinions. I am well aware that my premise is a bit artificial, it is designed that way. Instead, you tapdance all around it and avoid answering. Well, you don't have to answer of course, but then don't try to change my premise. It's a hypothetical situation, designed to get to the core. It's not 'an example'.
Jan
You know very well that the answer you would like to your question does not exist and you know very well that I didn't behave as you describe.
Maybe you just want to get this thread closed, as has often happened in the past.
Go ahead!
One more thing.
I believe that the so-called objectivists (if any) should prepare in time, because if one day a measurement will be discovered that will tells us how an amplifier sounds, I believe that some designers should go into hiding.
At the same time many other designers would receive all the moral and commercial success they deserve.
I believe that the so-called objectivists (if any) should prepare in time, because if one day a measurement will be discovered that will tells us how an amplifier sounds, I believe that some designers should go into hiding.
At the same time many other designers would receive all the moral and commercial success they deserve.
Of course the answer exists! In fact, I can think of multiple answers. There's no 'answer I would like', where did you get that??
But hey, if you are afraid to confront them, don't get involved. Nobody is forcing you.
Edit: your post #340 is ... interesting. I, as a designer, would welcome a measurement that would tell me how an amplifier sounds; at least now I know how to design the best sounding amplifier in the world!
Jan
See, I've often noticed in the past that as soon as issues regarding listening to systems are touched upon you suddenly become polemical.
Perhaps you do it to dilute attention on certain argumentations and often in the past I noticed you have even succeeded in your goal.
Are you talking about fear?
How the hell can anyone say that one can be afraid on a forum if not for pure controversy?
Please note that I'm certainly not afraid to declare my ideas on any topic and please note that I don't have to defend anything - not even my own ideas - because I'm a music lover and that's it.
Can you say the same about yourself?
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